


Little Red Wing

by AxisMage



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Because we all know about Dick and redheads, F/M, Female Jason Todd, Fluff, Genderbending, Light-Hearted, Redheaded Jason Todd, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-15
Updated: 2018-04-15
Packaged: 2019-04-23 03:21:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14323449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AxisMage/pseuds/AxisMage
Summary: Four times Dick Grayson noticed Jay Todd was not the little girl he´d barely known before she died. Four times he paid too much attention to her hair





	Little Red Wing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LorelainMichaelis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LorelainMichaelis/gifts).



> Genderbending! Because who doesn´t like genderbender :3. I for one love it so darn much, and while talking with my best friend the idea of a redheaded fem!Jason came up, and then oh boy, we remembered Dick´s little infantuation with redheads. So this came out! Props to her for the idea!

Dick had almost forgotten what she´d looked like. A young angry girl with hair as fiery as her temper, that was the strongest and fullest concept that came to mind. A small and vulnerable girl that wasn’t as tough as she pretended to be. A little girl that had died way sooner than she should have. That was what Dick thought whenever someone brought her up. If he was honest with himself, he hadn’t thought about her much after his anger towards Bruce had somewhat dwindled and she had died. He had never expected to see her come back to life.

Then again, he wondered if the woman with a gun trained on him right now even was the same person. A part of him told him it was. Batman had run the blood test. Batman had seen her without the helmet more than once already, had fought against her before. It was real. She was real.

Jay Todd was alive.

Dick´s gaze searched the red helmet, trying to find any trace of emotion, expression, within the red and shiny material. There was none of course, but the pouring rain above them didn´t help his case at all. The water curtain was thick and heavy enough that she looked somewhat blurry. She had to be as wet as he was, which meant soaked through. He was beginning to feel the cold even through his suit. He figured she would be feeling chilly as well, but if she was, she didn´t show it. Her stance was as firm as ever, back perfectly straight, arm and gun steady and pointing very much at him.

“Don´t you get tired of holding that up?”

Despite it being a shout, the rain swallowed most of the sound. As a couple more minutes ticked by, he wondered if she had even heard him.

“What do you want?” Finally, she had spoken. Her voice sounded electronic and deeper thanks to the helmet. He didn´t recognize it at all. It was not the voice he had heard from the first girl Robin, not even a trace left, and he was sure it wasn’t all because of the voice modulator.

He took a moment to soak in those four words. He tried taking a step forward, and her other hand came up to help hold the gun. Water dripped off the sleeves of her heavy leather jacket, off the gun to pool at her booted feet.

“I´m glad to see you alive,” Dick said.

Her scoff came almost immediately. “Not the first time you see me after I came back.”

“I didn’t know it was you when Batman and I first saw you on the streets.”

“You should have.” The words cut the air like a knife. Dick couldn’t help but wince, and even Jay must have felt because she shifted the weight from one foot to another.

“Jay…” Dick began.

“What do you want, Dick? I have a very busy schedule and have already lost enough time trying not to pull the trigger. What do you want?”

Many answers came to mind, but he figured most of them would get him killed, if not all of them. Maybe the main reason he was there wouldn’t make her pull the trigger.

“He wants to see you.”

Or maybe that particular reason would speed up his death.

… _Or maybe not_ , he thought astonished, because soon after he spoke, he saw her shoulders sag ever so slightly, and the gun went down. Her hands came up to take the helmet off, and for a precious moment Dick thought she was letting her guard down, that those few words had hit… something…

“Fuck you, Grayson, and most importantly, fuck Bruce a thousand times.”

Or not.

Dick frowned, opened his mouth to speak. However, before he could even get a word out, the helmet came off, and he was left staring into the face of a very angry, young, and certainly not so little anymore Jay Todd.

Her hair was redder, darker than he remembered, cut in a sharp and straight bob with a shock of white that fell over one eye. She let the helmet fall to the ground, pulled back the white lock with an angry movement, and bright greenish eyes met Dick´s.

“He didn´t kill him. He didn´t kill me. He didn´t do anything, Dick. He let it all slide! Again!” she said, each word spoken a bit louder until she was screaming. “He had the chance to either finish that son of a bitch or me. He didn´t choose! He let it all happen again! Again, Grayson!” His name was followed by a wordless shriek, and her hands went up to her hair, grabbed fistfuls of it. Her body started trembling, and Dick could see her teeth sink into her bottom lip.

Something inside Dick´s chest hurt. Now that was something he´d seen before back when Jay was still Robin. Her frustration, her anger, her helplessness at whatever stunt Bruce was trying to pull off or trying to keep her from doing. It was an old habit, and while this woman could be a new Jay, it was obvious the little girl he´d known was still somewhere in there.

“Jay,” he began, and took a step forward.

“Don´t!” It was a hiss, an order, a plea. Her hands moved, her palms dug into her eyes. “Don´t even try to defend him. Don´t try to tell me he was right. Don´t try to tell me to let go and to tell me what I did was wrong. It wasn´t. I am not the one who´s wrong!”

Her voice broke at the last sentence, and Dick´s chest heaved once again. He stared at her under the pounding rain, watching as her hair stuck to her head, saw how her whole body dripped water onto the pavement. He got the impression the water sliding down her body substituted the tears she was trying so hard to hold in.

He sucked in a breath, tried to keep his tone steady as he spoke. “Jay, look, Bruce and I just…”

“No.”

“We only want you to…”

“No.”

“We want you to come home.”

Another scream cut through the air. She pulled her hands away from her eyes, wiped angrily at her cheeks, pulled back her wet hair, fingers desperate.

“I don´t have a home anymore,” she said through gritted teeth. “I am alone, have always been and will always be.” She picked up the helmet, brought one of her guns back up.

“Stay away from me, Grayson, and keep Bruce away, or help me God, if the Joker doesn’t die, one of you will.”

Dick flinched. He held out his arm, took a step forward. His lips moved, but before any sound could come out the world turned white, and thunder followed a few seconds later. Dick blinked as his eyes adjusted to the dark once more. By the time he focused on the spot where Jay had been standing, there was nothing but rain to see.

That was the first time Dick saw her.

`•.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.••.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.•

 

The next time he ran into Jay, Bruce was dead, crime was running amok in Gotham and Dick felt as if the cowl were choking him even though the suit was still encased in its glass compartment inside the batcave.

“Stop acting like a righteous asshole and put the damn thing on!”

Her voice echoed all through the enormous cave, and a solid punch followed a second later. It hit Dick square in the jaw, and he didn´t even fight the fact he was falling. He hit the ground hard, felt his face throb immediately, but he made no move to get up or protect himself. Instead, he just raised his eyes and stared.

Her hair was longer. That was the first thing he´d noticed when she´d stormed her way into the cave. The bob cut was gone, and she now sported her hair in a braid that hung slightly below her shoulder, dark red hair contrasting quite nicely with the white touch near her forehead and what he´d learned had become her standard leather jacket. Her eyes still burned like greenish fire, and the set of her face was just as furious as it´d been the last time.

 His silence seemed to anger her more, and she turned around, kicked the closest piece of equipment.

“If you don´t put that damn thing on I will, and I will do things my own way.”

Dick wiped at the corner of his mouth, stared at the blood before getting to his feet. He stepped closer to her, feeling his own temper flare. “I am not going to let you run around the city killing people, Jay.”

“Gotham needs someone to keep it clean! Why can´t you see that?”

“Killing is not keeping the city clean!”

“Yes it is, it´s what the city needs!”

“They need you, you mean?”

Jay kicked metal again, closed what space was left between them and thrust a finger into his chest. “I am giving you one chance to try and make thing right your way, Grayson. His way. Stop being a coward and _take the damn cowl_. You´re supposed to be the protégé, aren’t you? You´re supposed to be his stupidly shiny Golden Boy. Act like it!”

Their faces moved closer at every word, her fingers ended up tangled in his shirt. Dick would have been distracted had it not been for the fact he was now angry.

“You don´t understand, Jay. You could never understand what taking up the Batman mantle would mean.”

“Why? Because I didn’t spend nearly enough time with him as you did? Because I was blown to bits before I could dig deeper into the Batman´s mind? Because I´m not you, the first and perfect Robin?”

“Don´t turn this conversation into something that it´s not.”

Jay gritted her teeth, tilted her head back and glared. “It all comes back to the same, Dick. And listen to what I´m saying very carefully. Take up the goddamn mantle, put on the stupid cowl. And. Protect. Gotham.” The last words were each said with another jab to his chest, and Dick had about enough. He shoved Jay´s hands away, and blocked the punch that came as soon as he´d done it. She hissed, brought her leg up, but Dick blocked it again, dug his fingers into her pants

“I don’t want to fight with you, but I will if you don’t calm the hell down,” he muttered.

“Maybe me kicking your ass will knock some sense into you.” She moved quick and twisted her leg out of his grip bringing her fists up as she moved into a fighting stance.

Dick´s blood rushed into his veins, his pulse was suddenly hammering the back of his throat as a rush of adrenaline flooded into his body. It was his usual reaction when being presented with the opportunity of a decent fight. In that moment, he hated both the fact that he couldn’t control himself and the fact that Bruce was dead and he was kind of tempted to give in and fight against Jay. A pointless fight, really, and yet…

“Come on, Goldie. Let´s make a deal. Fight me, and if you win, I´ll stop nagging you. You do whatever the hell you want while Gotham falls apart. If I win, you get that suit on as soon as I kick your goody-two-shoes ass and go on patrol.”

It was a trap. And they both knew it.

“If I win, you´ll stop nagging me, but you´ll take on the streets yourself, with or without the bat suit, and I´ll need to hunt you down, Jay. It´s a lose-lose for me.”

She grinned, though it was more just a bare of teeth. “Then relax, drop the ready-to-flip-over-your-head stance you´ve got going on.”

They stared at each other in crackling and electric silence for a few minutes. Then Dick was ducking, diving in, one long leg trying to sweep her feet out from under her.

“I may be a psychopath, but a competitive one,” Jay called as she jumped, eyes glimmering for the first time with something other than anger.

“For someone who can play people so easily with that charming smile and pretty eyes, you are pretty easy to play yourself, Grayson,” she added as she jumped and drove her own foot into Dick´s stomach.

 

`•.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.••.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.•

 

Jay was with two other fiery redheads when they saw each other again. Well, actually, next to Jay, not even Kori would count as “fiery”. And Roy… well, he was Roy.

Jay had changed. Dick could see it once they were all back at the manor, as safe as they could be given their lifestyles and what had just happened. Even after the Joker had torn open all their old wounds, even Jay´s, Dick could see a difference in her, a good one. She was not the fragile, extremely hurt and volatile woman made of thin glass she´d been the night they´d first seen each other under the rain. She wasn’t as much of a ticking time bomb as she´d been when they´d met in the cave. Her eyes weren’t burning pools of hate and anger anymore. Now… the hate had dwindled, almost disappeared. It was not only in her eyes, but in the way she moved, carried herself, the way she spoke.

“Geez, Goldie, you might as well have come out to say goodbye. I know you already said you don’t want to talk to her and even though she says she doesn’t remember you, I think she does. A couple words wouldn´t hurt.” Dick hadn’t noticed when Jay had left the garden, where Roy and Kori still sat with Alfred, and had come into the living room, from where he´d been spying on them.

Jay stopped in front of the couch where he was sitting on. She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, taking on a challenging expression. Dick was glad to see the Joker´s acid really hadn’t left any permanent damage on her lovely face. “Or what? Is the great Dick Grayson feeling shy? Speechless? _Awkward_?”

Dick raised an eyebrow in return, stretching out on the couch, resting both arms on the cushioned back. He took in her appearance this time, not only her face. Her leather jacket was back in place, as were her dark clothes. Or rather, her body armor. She looked ready to go back into the streets, or wherever it was she and her…friends went to fight crime in their own special way.

His eyes slid to her hair, and half his breath ran out. She wore it loose this time, and it fell past her shoulders, past her breasts, the tips almost reaching her waist. For a moment, he looked back outside at Kori, remembering her impossibly long and vibrant hair.

Jay´s wasn’t like that. Hers wasn’t as long, wasn’t as bright, and it didn’t look as soft as Kori´s had felt under his fingers. He supposed it reflected quite well the differences between the two women. He also had the sudden urge to stand and tangle the long dark locks around his fingers, feel them for himself.

Jay frowned at his silence. He blinked, offered her a lazy smile. “I wasn’t staring at Kori.”

Her frown deepened. “Roy would be more than happy to talk to you. You two annoying jabberboxes would hit it off in an instant.”

Dick rolled his eyes, let out a snort. He rose to his feet, and while his movements were careful, they were also firm. He took one lock of hair between his fingers, found it was softer than it looked. Much like Jay herself, he thought with amusement. Rock hard exterior, while inside, there were still remnants of the little girl he´d met in his Robin costume.

“It´s nice seeing you home again, Jay,” he said.

She was staring at him through hard and narrowed eyes. Her body had tensed, her lips had settled into a thin line. There was no sound between them for what could have been a whole hour, and their staring contest ended only when Roy bounded into the room.

Jay jerked away, and Dick let go of her hair in time. When Roy faced them, they were standing a decent distance away from each other.

“You ready to go, Jaybird?” he asked as he sauntered up to her and slung a casual arm over her shoulders, then dropping his silly cap on her head.

Jay scoffed, gave a half-hearted push before taking off the cap and holding it in her hand. “I´ve been ready for hours, but you had to ask Alfred for more cookies.”

“Hey, your butler makes the most delicious cookies I´ve ever tasted. Besides, he offered. Couldn´t turn him down.”

Jay rolled her eyes, shoved Roy off and threw him the cap before smoothing out her hair and focusing her attention back on Dick, who´d been watching their interaction with something akin to curiosity and… envy?

“See you never, Grayson,” she said, and Roy just managed to call out a goodbye before the two of them walked back out into the garden. Words were exchanged, then Jay stayed a bit behind to talk to Alfred. Moments later, Kori was flying the three of them away.

Alfred stayed a good twenty minutes outside, staring up at the sky. By the time he went into the living room, Dick´s eyes were still focused somewhere on the other side of the window.

`•.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.••.¸¸.•´´¯`••._.•

 

Dick couldn’t sleep. He didn’t know if it was because the cot was more uncomfortable than all the floors he´d slept in before or because he couldn’t stop seeing the stupid clown costume Jay had pulled out for him. Either way, at this rate, he might need to go run on top of a couple of trailers before sleep finally came.

He sighed, rolled out of bed and snuck past a sleeping Artemis and out of the trailer. Bizarro was nowhere to be seen, and he thought Jay hadn’t come back either until he walked out of the trailer and saw her sitting on the steps, a cigarette between her lips.

Both her eyebrows went up, and she blew smoke rings at him. “Done already?”

It didn’t take a genius to figure out what she meant.

“What can I say. Not even an Amazon is match enough for me.”

The cigarette bobbed between her lips in actual surprise. Dick prided himself in managing to get that reaction from her.

“You think you´re such a big and hot shot, don’t you, Goldie?” she muttered, inhaling again.

“And you´re such a nice and considerate friend, deciding to wait out here until Artemis and I finished having sex.”

Her shoulders tightened, but she managed to keep a straight face, and the comment only earned him a soft and weak ‘fuck you’. Not bad at all, pretty tame considering it was Jay he was taking to.

“Artemis and I didn’t have sex,” he said, and dropped next to her with a fluid movement. She froze again, then rolled her shoulders and went back to her relaxed inhalation of smoke.

“I don´t care whether you did or didn’t. You both are grownups,” she all but growled, then added. “Besides. Redhead. Even Bizarro could tell you liked her.”

“Right.” Dick let out a chuckle, reached up to grab a strand of Jay´s hair. She´d cut it since the last time, and now it hung wavy and over her shoulders, almost as if she´d just pulled it out of a braid. “She´s not the only redhead of the group now, is she?”

Jay tilted her head, gave him a very eloquent look. “You´ll really hit anything that moves and has red hair, won't you?”

Dick frowned at that, but before he could say anything, she held up a hand. “Fine. I stand corrected. You´ll fall in love with any redheaded girl that allows you to get close.”

“Is that why you won´t stay in the same place as me for more than a couple days?”

This time, she threw him a disbelieving glance. Silence clung between them for a couple of minutes, then she threw the cigarette on the ground, put it out with a heavy stomp of her sneaker.

“You´re crazy, Dick. Fucking crazy. And delusional.”

Dick rolled his eyes as he let out a snort. He debated on what to say next, what was it he even wanted to say. He tangled a few more locks of hair around his fingers, and when she didn’t pull back, he leaned in close to her, breath tickling her cheek.

Jay went as still as a rock. She turned her head, and they were suddenly staring at each other from less than two inches away. Dick´s lips curved into a smile, and he leaned in a bit further. He could feel her breath against his own, could almost taste her lips on…

“See? Fucking delusional if you think I´m going to let you do that.” A hand settled on his shoulder, and he was pushed away right after. He blinked at her, found the tiniest of smiles tugging at the corners of her lips.

“You aren’t going to play me so easily, Goldie. If you want to kiss and talk about emotional shit, you´re going to have to put some actual effort into it.” And with that she stood, tilted her chin at him one last time before opening the trailer´s door.

Dick rubbed the back of his head, gave a lopsided smile. “Have I ever told you how much I secretly like darker red hair?”

“I just bet you do. Night, Goldie.”

Dick laughed, watched as the door closed. “Night, Little Red Wing.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I did my homework and tried to keep it in the same somewhat canonical order in which I followed Jason´s appearance in comics (I did my best I swear ToT). Basically: after Under the Red Hood, a twist for Jason in Battle for the Cowl, and then two Outlaws loops (kind of). I hope it was somewhat enjoyable and understandable, thank you so much for reading!


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